He who attempts to expound the Epistle to the Romans, when his sacred task is over, is little disposed to speak about his Commentary; he is occupied rather with an ever deeper reverence and wonder over the Text which he has been permitted to handle, a Text so full of a marvellous man, above all so full of God. It remains only to express the hope that these pages may serve in some degree to convey to their readers a new Tolle, Lege for the divine Text itself; if only by suggesting to them sometimes the words of St Augustine, "To Paul I appeal from all interpreters of his writings."

This book is intended principally to remind those whose hearts the European War has stricken of the hope and comfort which lie ready for their wounds in our Lord Jesus Christ. I shall be glad indeed if anything in my pages may bring help to other sorrowing souls; for grief and death do not suspend their normal visitation among us, the infliction of the sore pains and losses of common life, because of their tremendous activities today on the field of battle, in the war-hospital, and on the deep. But I have written with these latter troubles more directly in view...

Charles Simeon had come up to King’s college from Eton, a wild undergraduate, famous for his love of horses and extravagance in dress; but one day he discovered that the rules of the college compelled him to receive the Communion on the following Sunday. He had lived in an utterly careless home, but he knew enough of religion to realise that attendance at the Lord’s Table was a serious thing, which should not be undertaken without some preparation. Not quite knowing what to do, he went to a bookseller’s shop, and bought a copy of Bishop Wilson on the Lord’s Supper, and learned from it for the first time the meaning of the Atonement...